Poker Bankrolls - How to manage???

[Oinkment]

Being a skint chef i am not the kind of poker player that plays a bankroll - i like to think i'm a bit of a "rounder" and I invest about 1/5 - 1/4 of my wages on poker (On and Offline) with the aim to earn from it. Sometimes i have good weeks and earn 5-10 times my investment and sometimes i have bad weeks and seem to just burn money.
But overall i seem to be winning and I spend my winnings on luxury items/ things i need rather than reinvest into poker. As i play tourneys not cash games it seems better to spend the cash rather than move up to bigger games or cash games.

My query is - how do other people manage their bankrolls -
Would it be better if i kept my poker finances seperate from my "real" money?

[7-2offsuit]

I think that anyone who takes their poker semi-seriously and is looking to better their game definitely needs some kind of measuring stick by which to gauge whether they really are up or down overall, and the simplest way to do that is to

a) Keep accurate records of your wins and losses and/or
b) Keep your playing funds seperate from your day-to-day expenses

The other benefit to maintaining a seperate bankroll is that you will always have some form of buffer (one which will enable you to stay in the game) against any swings you might experience or unexpected changes in your day-to-day circumstances. Additionally, not having such a hand-to-mouth existence might also be beneficial to your game, and if you only syphon off a small percentage of any profits you might make (to buy coats/poker chips et cetera!) you can ultimately build up your BR and move up to bigger limit games or higher buy-in tournaments.

Typical requirements are that you should have a reserve of 300xBB for any Limit ring (cash) game - so if you are playing £1/£2 you should really maintain a BR of around £600, and you would normally sit down with around 30-50xBB in any single session.

If you play No Limit ring games the recommendation is that you keep around 20 times whatever the typical buy-in is, so in a £10 buyin game (like the ones we play), you want to have about £200 behind you. Swings can be huge in this game, as you know.

For the games you most typically play - tournaments and Sit and Gos - the usual suggestion is that you maintain a BR of around 25-30 times your typical buy-in, so if you usually play £10+£1 SnGs then your BR should be around £250-300. Personally I think you could get by with a lot less if you're entering single table SnGs, as I would expect you to money in these things a lot more, but if you're entering a lot of really big MTTs the likelihood of your finishing ITM is always going to be that much lower so you need some kind of safety net.

To answer your query about bankroll management, I personally play the $20+$2 SnGs on Stars and $1/$2 ring games and try to keep my online funds to around the $1K mark. I never cash out, I know exactly what I bought in for, so I know exactly how I'm doing and I always have the funds available to play whenever I fancy it. In live play as you know I do keep records so again I know exactly how I'm doing. Like you though, I always spunk my profits so whenever I want to play live I just go to the hole in the wall (or sponge off Woody!).

As to whether it would be better for you to keep your poker finances seperate from your "real" money, well that's probably best for you to decide. If you're actually quite happy with how you handle things right now, why change 'em? If, however, you posed the question because you think it might be better for you to maintain a bankroll, I'd recommend you suck it and see - it certainly couldn't do you any harm...

[Oinkment]

You know that was just the kind of advice I was looking
for! My main worry is that i do tend to "spunk up" my winnings quite royally sometimes (oh the temptations of the big city) and am starting to think that i could of entered some nice big games instead and pushed up the winnings even higher. I have kept accurate records since early march and i have quadrupled my investments and its nice to think that poker has definitly improved my lifestyle.
(nice coats, Hats, chips, island rum ect ect LOL)

However i am worried that doing it rounders style could set me up for a big fall eventually and I know lots of other players keep their finances separate for that reason.

I might just try putting in 25 X the touney entry and
playing off that for a couple of months.

Thanks for the advice.... I will update you so you know if it worked.

[PokerWoody]

Bankroll management and honest record keeping - probably the hardest part of the game! Unfortunately I had to lose my bankroll before I started to take these subjects seriously. Nothing like a 12x buy in downswing to re-evaluate your position on the matter! Mind you, I also used to think that winning players ALWAYS won as well!!

One thing I will say on the subject is that everyone has a different bankroll requirement and what is right for me might well be wrong for you. Work out what you want from the game, formulate a bankroll around those requirements and don’t get greedy

[Oinkment]

I was unsure till i kept alog of wins and how much putting in initially. It looked bad for weeks till i reasoned that tounamount play was a harder to get a regular return on investment in tourneys over cash games. I have been sticking up to£45 a week to pay for 20 touney entrys. And always cash out sums of £50 and £100 leaving the surplus (normally £20 or so) for "free touneys".

over a 2 month period on William Hill i put in about £200
but cashed out over £700 so made about 800 profit but spent the surplus (about 200-250 i think) on bigger buy in games which seem so much harder LOL.

It is tough when u have 2-3 weeks with no win though and it feels like a big fruit machine. Then i have a run and win 4-5 in a week and just live way out of my normal lifestyle for that week.

I really liked daves tips on keeping things as seperate as possible. And playing off 25 X the touney over a month will be kinder on my wallet than 20 a week. Maybe playing 20 a week till early in the morning is why I don't regulary win....

didnt we have a discussion on playing too much before though.... LOL

[PokerWoody]

Yep, I think there is some very good advice in there. Personally I don't play tournaments (well, very occasionally but just for a bit of fun) but that 25-30x buy advice sounds right to me.

The problem I have with 'out of the book' bankroll advice is that it assumes you will drop down levels when you're running bad. If I were to drop 10x buyins again then I don't want to drop down to any level lower than where I currently play - which my bankroll would force me to do. Although dropping 10 buyins hopefully won't happen to frequently I am sure that it will happen again. I also tend to do worse when dropping down limits as I suffer from money blindness and don't properly adjust to the players. I therefore chose to maintain a 40x buyin bankroll rather than the standard 20x.

If you are playing online and play on more than one site (ie you’re a bonus whore) and don't have a bank account dedicated to poker funds then you are a much better money manager than me!

[Oinkment]

This was good too off some website...

"Even after years, the big majority of regular poker players never seem to come to grips with exactly what the heck they are doing -- or, more precisely, what they are trying to do. Today let's just focus on poker for money. Forget anything having to do with relaxation, the challenge or fun. Just consider poker playing and the making of (or losing of) money.

Middle-limit ring game players are notorious for crying like two year olds whenever time collection charges are due. There are lots of anecdotal stories about high limit players who shriek at dealers or waitresses who assume a dollar chip was meant as a tip. But at the same time, very few players seem to understand that they win (or lose) money just like a worker punching a time clock. You put in the hours, and you make or lose your expectation. You apply and re-apply your advantages endlessly, and you accumulate dribbles and droplets of profit from everything you do in, around, and in preparation for poker games.

But that just sounds like hooey to most players. All they see is pots... big pots, small pots... big winning days, crappy losing days. They fall into the trap of thinking money is made in lumps. They think it springs full-grown from Zeus' forehead. But that is not how it works. Money is made by planting seeds, nursing seedlings, and cultivating the resultant crops.

All winning poker is simply a matter of putting in the hours when you have the best of it. Hopelessly un-sexy, but there it is.

Poker tournaments are no different, even though the wrong thinking of most players is at its peak when thinking of tournaments.

Because they have a relatively low rake, and because skill is more highly valued, tournaments will always be extremely profitable and a good use of time for top players.
.
A large number of players will never be suited for tournaments simply because they can't get their brain around the concept of not winning for months at a time, and then reaping a big windfall. That windfall is simply payment for all the hours put in while not winning. All those hours were compensated at the same rate (assuming the player always played roughly at the same quality level). Winning isn't a big score, and, big news flash, you should not spend money like a sailor when it happens. That win is merely a lump sum payment for the hours you ground out over many days, weeks or months. All your expenses must be factored against that win, and the time commitment it took.

Both the tournament and ring game poker worlds are riddled with talented but busted deadbeats who don't understand that poker is a lifetime game of milking small edges.

Winning poker is a methodical process of cause and effect, of seeds and crops. Suckers think of tournaments in terms of "the big score". Don't fall into the trap. Tournaments are hourly wage labor, where your own skills and your own ongoing frugality determine the wage."